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Patrick Chitumba, Midlands Bureau Chief
THE Zimbabwe Energy Regulatory Authority (Zera) has withdrawn five licences from Independent Power Producers (IPP) who have failed to come up with integrated energy resource plans.

Some of the IPPs have been accused of holding onto the licences for speculative purposes.

In an interview on the side-lines of the inception workshop on renewable energy policy development in Gweru yesterday, Mr Partson Mbiriri, the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Energy and Power Development, said Zera had initially licensed about 30 IPPs.

“We have about 30 IPPs holding on to licenses that have been approved. A few have implemented their projects like in the Eastern Highlands but the majority haven’t because of a number of reasons. We are looking at individual licences and where there is no appreciable movement in terms of implementation of a licensed project, the regulatory authority has cancelled some licenses and so far five have been cancelled,” he said.

Mr Mbiriri said Government was reluctant to issue more licences in the prevailing environment.

He said Government was looking at crafting a policy on IPPs through the integrated energy resources plan to ensure that only capable producers are given the tenders.

“We need to see how to assess IPPs on whether to follow the route of unsolicited bids which we are currently using or whether we go for the  auctioning system where you will say we have a site here and may the best company win in terms of specifications we would have put in place,” said Mr Mbiriri.

“The current unsolicited bids tend to be expensive because there is no control of those bids and there is no competition.”

Zera chief executive officer Engineer Gloria Magombo is on record as saying that among all those registered only 10 are producing electricity at low capacity.— @pchitumba1.